Scheduling Your Adventure

For details on how to move forward with your Adventure Spirit experience, please click here.

Considerations in Hiring a Guide-Instructor

Beyond simply safety reasons, there are many other reasons to consider hiring a skilled guide-instructor. Here are a few articles that our Lead Guide Kel Rossiter contributed to that explain some of the benefits:

As with any profession, training and on-going development is vital to maintaining proficiency. With that in mind, we also suggest you check out The American Mountain Guide Association (AMGA) page here that details the training and testing process that goes into becoming a IFMGA Certified Mountain Guide.

Northeastern Trip Planning Resources

General

Vermont

Go Stowe: Provides a range of resources useful for your travels to and within the Stowe (VT) area.

Lake Placid Homepage: Provides a range of resources useful to your travels to and within the Lake Placid/ADK High Peaks area.

Lodging

AirBnB and a variety of other house/hotel online sites are becoming a great go-to source for lodging options, allowing you to choose the place that best fits your financial and amenities priorities. Below are a few ideas that you might find useful to consider as well.

Green Mountain Club: Offers an array of lodging options in the Green Mountains, as well as information on a host of topics related to the conservation and enjoyment of the Green Mountain outdoors.

New Hampshire

White Mountains Hostel: A great place to stay in the Mt. Washington Valley (NH) if you're with a group or on a budget. A full kitchen allows you to save on meals.

The Notch Hostel: A great place to stay in the Franconia Notch Area (NH) if you're with a group or on a budget. A full kitchen allows you to save on meals.

Appalachian Mountain Club: Offers an array of lodging options in the White Mountains, as well as information on a host of topics related to the conservation and enjoyment of the Appalachian outdoors.

Adirondacks

Keene Valley Hostel: A great place to stay in Keene Valley (NY) if you're with a group or on a budget. A full kitchen allows you to save on meals. It is also possible to save a bit more money by camping outside and you can still use the hostel's kitchen and shower/bath facilities.

Ice Conditions: Some post-people and hashtags we follow on social media are @neclimbs, @ne_ice_conditions, #neiceconditions, #northeastice

Travel & Rescue Insurance

For all your adventure-related travel we strongly recommend travel and rescue insurance. For all of our international trips, we require that you purchase a comprehensive rescue insurance plan. Here are two companies we have worked with and recommend.

Travelguard: Travelguard provides policies to insure the expenses of your trips. Our guides have purchased policies numerous times over the years and have cashed in on the policies twice. In both cases, Travelguard was very prompt and complete in their refunding of costs incurred. When setting up a policy, be sure to advise them you plan to engage in adventure activities and we highly suggest a policy covering pre-existing conditions.

Global Rescue: Many people assume that with their American Alpine Club membership they are covered, but it is important to remember that coverage only goes up to $12,500. The reality of the matter is that just putting the key into the ignition of a fully-staffed rescue helicopter costs more than $12,500. We highly recommend the policies offered through Global Rescue. Perusing their website you'll see they are a world leader in rescue, with a well-staffed, well-trained operation that has experience in a range of rescue conditions. Policies are available per-trip or on an annual basis. Check out options here.

Clothing, Equipment, & Gear Prep Resources

There is a lot of great gear out there and a lot of great gear suppliers. And having the appropriate gear is important. But when exploring gear, rmoderation is the key: Sometimes it seems that people spend too much time grocking over gear and not enough actually using it! The most important thing in preparing for any adventure is not gear preparation—it is physical, mental, and technical preparation. As the saying goes, "Greater climbers have accomplished more with less."

Also in preparing gear for your adventure, another great quote comes from Antoine St. Exupery, who said, "Perfection is not reached when there's nothing more to add, but when there's nothing more to take away." Focus on simplifying your system and staying physically prepared, and then with whatever time remains, you can check out some of our favorite gear resources below:

Ortovox: Ortovox produces a top-quality range of climbing and skiing clothing and equipment, effectively balancing style and functionality, while always keeping a keen eye on the human and ecological processes involved in production.

Outdoor Gear Exchange: This on-line site offers tremendous bargains on new, used, clearance, and closeout merchandise, all supported by very friendly and knowledgeable staff. Additionally, their bricks-and-mortar site site in Burlington, VT has an entire basement filled with quality clothing, climbing, and backcountry skiing consignment items.

Darn Tough Vermont Socks: Darn Tough Socks set the highest bar for performance and comfort in the field. And each pair of socks is backed up with an incredible lifetime warranty.

Adirondack Rock: This website serves as a supplement to the excellent guidebook of the same name. On the website you can find info on new routes not in the book and lots of great photos of cliffs and routes in the 'Daks.

Vermont Rock: Vermont finally has it's own rock guidebook! And there are still lots of new routes being put up—this website has info on new routes that are not in the guidebook.

General Climbing & Outdoor Resources

Mountain Project: If you don't already know about this climbing resource, you should definitely bookmark it. It's got a tremendous amount of information about climbing sites in the US and internationally. One word of caution: Take any information you read there—particularly anything you read in the Comments section—with a big boulder of salt.

All-Trails: This site serves as a good database for hikes all over the US. As with any online, open-source site, quality and accuracy of the content/information can range.

Stephabegg Trip Reports: Stepha Begg is a Washington-based woman who has climbed many/most of the Cascades' classic climbs. In between all of that, she somehow finds time to create very informative trip reports with excellent photo documentation.

Climbing & Backcountry Skiing Reading You Might Enjoy

General Reading Related to Adventure Spirit

Here are a few articles written about climbers' experiences with Adventure Spirit, as well as a variety of essays, tech tips, opinion pieces, and gear reviews written by or with our Lead Guide, that you might find interesting::

Climbing & Backcountry Skiing-Related Associations We Support

American Mountain Guides Association (AMGA): For over 30 years, the American Mountain Guides Association (AMGA) has been dedicated to supporting the guiding community through excellence in education, standards and certification to enhance the quality of services provided to the public, while serving as a resource for accessing and protecting the natural environment.

Climbing Resource Access Group of Vermont (CRAG-VT): CRAG-VT provides service to the Northeastern climbing community through preserving climbing opportunities in Vermont and promoting responsible stewardship of climbing areas. CRAG-VT purchases/owns many of the notable crags in Vermont and fosters relationships with owners and state agencies that manage other sites. Their efforts are vital in protecting climbing opportunities in the Northeast. If you're a resident of Vermont and/or have been climbing here for more than a year, you need to become a member.

Vermont Outdoor Guide Association (VOGA): VOGA is dedicated to the support and promotion of professional outdoor leadership, education, and stewardship.in Vermont. The organization accomplishes this through advocacy in state legislature, coordinating the efforts or Vermont guides across a range of activities, and providing a website clearinghouse for advertising Vermont guide services that attracts tourism to the state. If you are a Vermont guide and/or are involved in aspects of the Vermont outdoor recreation economy, you should strongly consider becoming a member.

The Access Fund: The Access Fund is a rock climbing advocacy group in the US. Their goals are twofold. First, keeping climbing areas open and gaining access to currently closed climbing areas. Second, they promote an ethic of responsible climbing and conservation of the climbing environment. Working closely with local climbing organizations, they are instrumental in helping secure access through providing loans for property purchases and negotiating access with owners and land management agencies. If you've been outdoor climbing for more than a year, become an active part of your climbing community and become a member.

The Vermont Land Trust (VLT): The VLT works to preserve and provide access to lands across the state of Vermont. Many of those places provide Northeastern climbers with opportunities for climbing, skiing, biking, and other outdoor activities. You should strongly consider supporting their work by becoming a member.

The American Safe Climbing Association (ASCA): This organization focuses on replacing old, deteriorating climbing bolts on many of the nation's most classic routes. They do not change the nature or safety ratings of routes, they only replace existing fixed protection. If you've ever enjoyed clipping bolts on a sport route—or praised the heavens for a reliable bolt when run out way above your trad gear—then you'll surely want to support this organization.

The American Alpine Club (AAC): The AAC is dedicated to building a united community of competent climbers and healthy climbing landscapes. In recent times, it has increasingly focused on the important aspect of climate change as it relates to preserving the mountain environments that climbers enjoy and the mountain cultures that inhabit them. You should strongly consider becoming a member.

Climb+Pick+Give: Through our Climb+Pick+Give Program, we support a select group of climbing and backcountry skiing and outdoor-related organizations. Take a look at that page here.

Climbing & Climate

Climbing, backcountry skiing, ski mountaineering, and all mountain sports are occurring in an increasingly climate-affected world. As a community of mountain enthusiasts, we need to stay informed and engaged. Check out our Climbing & Climate Page for useful resources on this topic.